Normally, banks and financial consultant will advice you to pay extra money into your mortgage. With this method, it will help you cut down the huge interest amount and reduce the period over which you pay back the loan.
For example, if you borrow $200 000 over 30 years at a rate of 5%, your monthly repayments would be around $1074. Over 30 years, you would actually pay $1074 x 360 (months), which is $386 640. That’s $186 640 in interest! What you have to do is to find an extra $246 a month, and pay $1320 a month into the mortgage, you’d cut 10 years off the repayment period – the loan would be fully paid in only 20 years. Moreover, your total payments would be $316 664, saving $69 756!
The flaw in this technique is that it ignores the time value of money. Everyone knows that money is worth less now than it was when they were younger. If you take that $1074 mortgage repayment, for instance, in 30 years time, when the last payment is due, it would only be worth $437 in today’s money.
A dollar now is always better than a dollar in a year’s time, or in 10 year’s time. You cannot simply subtract the mortgage interest...